So you want to start learning how to draw flowers, huh? Well, let’s get Inkscape open and go over how to draw a clip art looking rose in this tutorial.
The Final Result
1. Top of the Flower
Step 1
Let’s start by drawing a simple circle for the top of the flower.
Step 2
Then use the Spiral tool to draw a spiral within the circle. You may have to tinker with the settings to get it to look just right.
Step 3
Select the circle and spiral and flatten them a bit like I have below. Also, while they’re still selected, let’s head up to Path > Object to Path to convert these.
Step 4
To give this rose some more character, I want to use tapered lines. To start this, just draw a flat ellipse somewhere on your canvas. Then copy it to your clipboard.
Step 5
Now, it’s time to open up the Path > Path Effect Editor. Select the spiral, add a Pattern Along Path effect, and finally click Paste path for the pattern source. Since we copied that ellipse, it’s shape will now be stretched along the spiral.
Step 6
After I removed the stroke, added some fill, and adjusted the stroke width, I ended up with something like this.
2. Base of the Flower
Step 1
To start creating the flower base, let’s grab the Pen tool and change the Shape to Triangle Out. Then just draw a cone shape like I have below.
Step 2
Next, grab the Nodes tool move/smooth things out to create that flower shape.
Step 3
While we still have the Nodes tool out, let’s just slightly bend some of the top parts to make it looks more natural.
Step 4
Now we want to add some color, but you’ll quickly notice that you can’t simply fill tapered lines. A quick trick to do this is to duplicate the tapered line, head to Path > Remove Path Effect, and then fill your new section with a color.
Step 5
Then just place the colored section behind the tapered line. I also colored the top circle the same red.
Step 6
Finally, I want to add a little petal detail here. Just use the Pen tool with a Triangle In shape and draw a curved line. Also, notice that the bottom of my petal line doesn’t meet up with the bottom very well. We’ll fix this in the next step.
Step 7
When you start trying to make tapered lines meet up at other places, they can sometimes leave little gaps. I’m just going to use a little “draw a black triangle” hack.
3. Stem and Leaves
Step 1
The stem is easy. Just use the Pen tool with a Triangle In shape to draw a very slightly curved line.
Step 2
The leaves are also fairly easy. Use the Pencil tool with a Triangle In shape and free hand a couple lines like I have below. Increase the Smoothing until you get the result you want.
Step 3
And draw another line down the middle to finish it up.
Step 4
As for coloring the leaf, use the same method in 2.4 to create a separate colored shape to place within the leaf.
Step 5
I wanted another leaf on the other side, so I grouped the first leaf, copied it, flipped it horizontally, shrunk it, and rotated it a little.
Step 6
All that’s left to do is add a background if you desire. Looks great, right?
And We’re Done!
This Inkscape tutorial was very heavy on using the Path Effect Editor, which creates a very clean looking rose. The end result is a little abstract and subtle on color, so this rose would probably fit for a bunch of uses. Thanks for reading!